Produced by Workhouse Productions, this new staging of Kae Tempest’s Wasted is deliberately far from subtle. An aggressively unsubtle exploration of the drifting many experience in their twenties, this revival is a raw and impressively slick debut work from a new theatre company.
Directed by Emily Rodrigues, this version of Tempest’s work blends, with maturity, a combination of well-selected genres. Opening with the performing trio holding a microphone, the piece shifts from gig theatre through to more in-your-face tropes, with Tempest’s play combining poignant, reflective monologues with assertive chorus exchanges which reiterate the isolation and gradual disillusionment of modern life for these characters.
When working as a three, the trio form a chorus, drawing out Tempest’s lyrical reflections on finding life’s meaning, contrasting sharply with the quiet devastation of each character’s reflections. Wasted is a bold deep-dive into the hollowness of modern life, with characters reconciling with their discomforting existences, and this is mirrored in this version’s defiant staging.
The production centres upon three drifting twenty-somethings, contending with a sense of hedonism while also struggling to contend with the death of their friend Tony, who, while absent in this production, looms heavily in the characters’ pained memories and awkward exchanges, long-impacted by their shared loss. Freddie Farrell’s Ted is a bleak office worker, unhappy with his existence but also stuck in indulging in just how miserable it makes him.
Meanwhile, Caitlin Florence-Rose’s Charlotte is a school teacher desperate to make a difference to those she teaches, but deeply unhappy about the social classes in the education system, and how it disengages and disenfranchises both staff and students. Rounding off the three is Eman Dare’s Danny, an aspiring musician whose positivity is dented by his hopes of rekindling his romance with Charlotte. As individuals, the three are absorbing when delving into each character’s sense of purposelessness, while under Rodrigues’s direction, the trio also combine neatly in explosive and tense interactions.
It is a play that feels deliberately grubby. Scattered furniture and graffitied walls frame the theatre’s intimate staging, and help to draw out Tempest’s depiction of substance abuse and the erosion of each character. Leila Ufer’s projections throw us into the early 21st-century nightclubs and raves, in a presentation that will be instantly recognisable for audiences of a certain age, though still oddly creating a piece that feels like a time capsule of a Britain gone by. The sense of stagnancy is a deliberate choice here, and works well to intensify the spotlight upon three lost individuals worn down by a shared trauma.
That said, there is something still deeply urgent about this unflinching production of Wasted, more than a decade from its premiere. National conversations about youth unemployment and career prospects dominate the headlines in 2026, and in this revival, the sense of waste for a generation remains palpable.
This production of Wasted ran at Etcetera Theatre from 19 – 20 September and was provided as a video recording by Workhouse Productions.
